Pages

Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Their weak-kneed response makes me think they weren't ever
authentic friends of the Dell at all.

Nearly 24 hours after the Nashville Sounds announced a new name for the ballpark in the Sulphur Dell area that will not include the historic name "Sulphur Dell", Friends of Sulphur Dell finally responded to the news that they hoped yesterday would be something regarding ballpark design.

Given that the Facebook group has operated like a well-oiled PR machine since the Mayor announced last Fall that Sulphur Dell was in, the long period of silence suggests to me that the naming news may have sent them reeling a bit. But this is the best they can muster this morning:

It will be Sulphur Dell Stadium [sic] to many of us...First Tennessee Stadium [sic] to the rest, but either way, baseball will be played there...and we'll be there to enjoy it!

Wow. That's it? Maybe to be more honest they should break into groups of "Friends of Sulphur Dell" and "Friends of First Tennessee". Either way, this is kind of a mess for the group that insisted to reporters that it was legit grassroots and not just astroturf.

Friends of Sulphur Dell could encourage some kind of debate so as not to look like complete tools of the Mayor's Office, lately left behind in the bid to bring bankers on board the ballpark bandwagon. But maybe they never really cared for our local history at all. If this was always more about bringing baseball here for economic development (what other reason could it be now?) then taking the name Friends of Sulphur Dell was bad faith, false expression and phony legitimacy.